Short Summary

Eighty-nine Basque Nationalists have been on hunger strike in various churches in French Basque country for almost two weeks ... 49 of them in Bayonne Cathedral.

Description

Eighty-nine Basque Nationalists have been on hunger strike in various churches in French Basque country for almost two weeks ... 49 of them in Bayonne Cathedral.

The strikers are demanding that the French Government stop the arbitrary expulsion of Spanish Basque refugees from French Basque country.

The hunger strikers say Spanish basque refugees have been subjected to administrative harassment, house arrest, and, on occasion, have been forced to move to other parts of France, if not moved out of the country altogether.

They claim that the French government is making life miserable for the refugees, because it doesn't want to upset existing, or future, trade agreements with Spain.

SYNOPSIS: Eighty-nine Basque nationalists have been on hunger strike in churches in French Basque country for almost two weeks...forty-nine of them in Bayonne Cathedral. The strikers say the French government has been subjecting Spanish Basque refugees to administrative harassment, house arrest and compulsory movement to other parts of France. They claim that, on occasion, whole families have been expelled. The French Government says it's taken action against some refugees because they've failed to observe political neutrality...but the strikers are demanding an end to the alleged harassment.

As well as sitting or lying around the churches, the hunger strikers have been handing out pamphlets which claim that the French government is afraid to offend the Spanish regime because of existing or future trade agreements.